• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

The Institute of Australian Culture

Heritage, history, and heroes; literature, legends, and larrikins

  • Home
  • Articles
  • Biographies
  • Books
  • Ephemera
  • Poetry & songs
    • Recommended poetry
    • Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
    • Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
    • Rock music and pop music [videos]
    • Early music [videos]
  • Slang
  • Timeline
    • Timeline of Australian history and culture
    • Calendar of Australian history and culture
    • Significant events and commemorative dates
  • Topics

Up North [poem by Mary Hannay Foott, 1890]

20 August 2012 · Leave a Comment

[Editor: A poem by Mary Hannay Foott.]

Up North.*

Into Thy hands let me fall, O Lord —
Not into the hands of men —
And she thinned the ranks of the savage horde
Till they shrank to the mangrove fen.

In a rudderless boat, with a scanty store
Of food for the fated three —
With her babe and her stricken servitor
She fled to the open sea.

Oh, days of dolor and nights of drouth,
While she watched for a sail in vain,
Or the tawny tinge of a river mouth,
Or the rush of the tropic rain.

The valiant woman! Her feeble oar
Sufficed, and her fervent prayer
Was heard, though she reached but a barren shore,
And died with her darling there.

For the demons of murder and foul disgrace
On her hearthstone dared not light ;
But the Angel of Womanhood held the place,
And its site is a holy site.

*The incident referred to in the above poem took place a few years ago in one of the small islands off the northern coast of Queensland. Mrs. Watson, wife of a bêche de mer fisher, was left, in her husband’s absence, with her infant child and two Chinese servants on the island. The homestead was attached by wild blacks from the mainland, one of the servants killed, and the other wounded. Mrs Watson defended her home so effectually with her revolver that the assailants withdrew. Fearing their return she placed some little provision in an iron tank, which had been cut down so that it served as a boat, and embarking in this frail vessel, with her child and the wounded man, she strove to make her way to some place of refuge. The tank was found some time afterwards on the shore of an uninhabited and waterless island, where the remains of the ill-fated voyagers were also discovered. Mrs. Watson kept a diary almost up to the last.



Source:
Mary Hannay Foott. Morna Lee and Other Poems, Gordon & Gotch, Brisbane, 1890, page 10

Previously published in:
Mary Hannay Foott. Where the Pelican Builds and Other Poems, Gordon & Gotch, Brisbane, 1885

Filed Under: poetry Tagged With: conflict Aborigines vs Whites, Mary Hannay Foott (1846-1918) (author), poem, SourceArchiveOrg, year1890

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Australian flag, Kangaroo, Wattle, 100hThe Institute of Australian Culture
Heritage, history, and heroes. Literature, legends, and larrikins. Stories, songs, and sages.

Search this site

Featured books

The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses, by Banjo Paterson A Book for Kids, by C. J. Dennis  The Bulletin Reciter: A Collection of Verses for Recitation from The Bulletin The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke, by C. J. Dennis The Complete Inner History of the Kelly Gang and Their Pursuers, by J. J. Kenneally The Foundations of Culture in Australia, by P. R. Stephensen The Australian Crisis, by C. H. Kirmess Such Is Life, by Joseph Furphy
More books (full text)

Featured lists

Timeline of Australian history and culture
A list of significant Australiana
Significant events and commemorative dates
Australian slang
Books (full text)
Australian literature
Rock music and pop music (videos)
Folk music and bush music (videos)
Early music (videos)
Recommended poetry
Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
Australian explorers
Topics
Links

Featured posts

Advance Australia Fair: How the song became the Australian national anthem
Brian Cadd [music videos and biography]
Ned Kelly: Australian bushranger
Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]

Some Australian authors

E. J. Brady
John Le Gay Brereton
C. J. Dennis
Mary Hannay Foott
Joseph Furphy
Mary Gilmore
Charles Harpur
Grant Hervey
Lucy Everett Homfray
Rex Ingamells
Henry Kendall
“Kookaburra”
Henry Lawson
Jack Moses
“Dryblower” Murphy
John Shaw Neilson
John O’Brien (Patrick Joseph Hartigan)
“Banjo” Paterson
Marie E. J. Pitt
A. G. Stephens
P. R. Stephensen
Agnes L. Storrie (Agnes L. Kettlewell)

Recent Posts

  • To Australia [poem by Ruby Jean Stephenson, 18 November 1943]
  • [General news items] [4 April 1912]
  • [Australia has had more than its share of shipping disasters of late] [4 April 1912]
  • [Probably Professor Marshall Hall was right] [4 April 1912]
  • Gold-seekers of the Fifties [1 July 1899]

Top Posts & Pages

  • The Man from Snowy River [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Rex Ingamells
  • Taking His Chance [poem by Henry Lawson]
  • The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Our pipes [short story by Henry Lawson]

Archives

Categories

Posts of note

The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]
A Book for Kids [by C. J. Dennis, 1921]
Click Go the Shears [traditional Australian song, 1890s]
Core of My Heart [“My Country”, poem by Dorothea Mackellar, 24 October 1908]
Freedom on the Wallaby [poem by Henry Lawson, 16 May 1891]
The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
Nationality [poem by Mary Gilmore, 12 May 1942]
The Newcastle song [music video, sung by Bob Hudson]
No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest [poem by Mary Gilmore, 29 June 1940]
Our pipes [short story by Henry Lawson]
Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
Shooting the moon [short story by Henry Lawson]

Recent Comments

  • IAC on How M’Ginnis Went Missing [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Stephen on How M’Ginnis Went Missing [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • IAC on The late Louisa Lawson [by George Black, 2 October 1920]
  • Percy Delouche on Freedom on the Wallaby [poem by Henry Lawson, 16 May 1891]
  • Phil on The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]

For Australia

Copyright © 2023 · Log in